Top 3 Leaders

[jakeantonetz]

Custom Game
Difficulty Immortal or Deity (Which ever level you are on in terms of ability)
Map - Fractal
No random events/ Goody huts
All of other settings standard

Which 3 leaders would you consider the strongest if you wanted to give yourself the best shot at winning in this situation. After 1 shotting my way up to Immortal I've had some problems at this level and decided to stop using random leader till I am more comfortable. So far the leader that I like the most is Darius; org/fin seems like all around good traits and his UU and UB ain't half bad either.

Does he make the list? Can you explain your choices? Thank you.
P.S. Big thanks to TMIT's vids great stuff.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Welcome to CFC!

Huayna Capac - Inca
Elizabeth - England
Darius - Persia

Just the best all rounders.

Notable mention - either Caesar (probably Julius at high level - industrious a bit hard to leverage).

 

[jakeantonetz]

Thank you for the quick reply; Huayna is probably gonna be my next try... I've had the game for almost 2 months but I never tried him, he looks insane in the civilopedia only thing I didn't like was the mysticism starting tech.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Hatshepsut rocks hard too.

The thing about Inca starting with mysticism is you can build Stonehenge for failure cash when you have conquered too many cities and have too many Quechua (works best on marathon speed). Not so good at normal but excellent barb defence until axes.

 

[bestrfcplayer]

You could try a Monty, Shaka, Ranger combo......

 

[rugbyLEAGUEfan]

Sumeria.........numeous ways of playing it . Early rush , Rex with Zigs , big tech comebacks with early great spy . No traits or uniques to help in the end game but a rock solid starter.

Hatchesput for AP cheese via obelisks

Inca for the same reasons as others have mentioned

 

[CornPlanter]

1. Darius - Persia. My absolute all time most successful leader. I always managed to win with him 1 or even 2 levels higher difficulty level than I normaly played on. Deity not included
2. Elizabeth - England. The first leader I managed to win Immortal with. (Didnt even try it with Darius. I was certain I could win it with Darius, pointless in terms of learnin new difficulty level...).
3. Hatshepsut - Egypt probably...

I also like Mehmed II very much and he seems to be strong but in practice I dont do so good with him.

 

[babar]

1. huayna/darius
3. julius (questionable on fractal though)
honorable mentions: liz, mehmed, hannibal
Personally I find that, more than random leader, fractal map increases the difficulty. At Immortal it can vary from a cake walk to almost impossible, which makes it hard to win consistently unless you know and are willing to use all the tricks. You could try something more predictable and pick the right leader for the job.

 

[NihilZero]

Organised and Financial are the top tier traits and Darius is the guy that has both. He allows players to perform above their difficulty level for that reason alone and those Immortals are pretty spectacular too.

Liz is possibly second in strength and England are a very strong and easy to use civ.

Mehmed needs a mention, he gets lots of discounted buildings, and the Ottomans are another of the top civs.

In general, anybody with Org or Fin is going to be good. Fin does however lend itself to a playstyle which may not translate quite so well to non-Fin leaders so you have to be aware of that.

 

[itg]

Gandhi and Mansa Musa are two top-tier leaders who often get overlooked. Ethiopia is very strong, as well.

 

[civnoob13]

you've been playing for two moths and you're already at immortal?


I've been playing (on and off, not that seriously until recently) for years and I'm only at noble.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Most people could reach DEITY in two months if they took a serious approach to the game rather than a casual one.

1. Inca - HC has solid/flexible traits, a tremendous UU for anti-barbarians to ease the pressure (and ease the capture of barb cities) of them regardless of start or possibly kill somebody, and one of the best UBs in the game for setting up new cities quickly. Capac can do anything and at most things he's above average. Coastal start? GLH and/or colossus. Heavy riverside? You can cottage spam like any other FIN. Close spawn to shaka? Wipe him out with 23059870 quechas before he can react. Isolation? Wonder whore and expand gradually.
2. Egypt - Ramesses has a top notch UU for some oomph if you get in tight quarters early, but he also has strong wonder/economy options if you do not. War chariots are objectively better than immortals, too (unless you want to use your chariot UU to defend a lot for some reason). UB is good for AP cheesing or farming out a prophet to shrine that captured holy city, but otherwise unimpressive.
3. Mansa Musa - Another leader with amazing barb defense, he also has a guaranteed choke option and the best early defenses in the game. The traits are solid if a little boring, though the UB is just ok.

Honorable mentions:

Darius - more a marathon guy, but the traits work for heavy expansion and the UU can rush well enough despite being the inferior chariot UU for that. UB is boring but not really bad.

Julius Caesar - Lost in the shadows of the prats is that he holds some nice traits that carry strong synergy regardless of situation. A little dependent on iron to TRULY shine, but a solid option in any game. UB sucks, but you can't have everything. Unless you're Inca.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

The minus point against Mansa is that if you pick him you have no chance of meeting him in game and trading with him, which is heavily relied upon in fast HoF games

 

[TheMeInTeam]

The minus point against Mansa is that if you pick him you have no chance of meeting him in game and trading with him, which is heavily relied upon in fast HoF games

He said he wanted the best shot at winning on immortal or deity/normal/fractal/no EXTRA imbalances.

He did not say "leader most likely to give me a high score if I cheese marathon early conquest and cook the settings by adding favorable AIs to pad my position from turn 0" .

If you're trying to get rid of a troublesome AI while allowing good ones, playing as someone like gilgamesh or shaka is helpful, but I doubt it materially assists winning odds in a random game...although both are solid leader/civ combos they don't make top 3.

 

[JustinianVII]

-Hannibal- Numidian Cavalry makes for a solid early unit--mobile Axemen that get to retreat. Cothon provides an economic boost with extra trade routes. Good traits make for happier cities and more commerce. Though if you're horseless and/or landlocked, this is a less desirable choice.
-Huayna- Already pretty well explained by earlier posts.
-Churchill- For great asskicking. Easily promoted army, happier cities. Protective lets you hold onto your cities and newly captured ones more easily. Coupled with Charismatic, it's quite easy to get Drill IV-promoted units quickly. And a city with a lot of settled great generals from those early wars will produce highly veteran Redcoats that will devastate all opposition pre-Railroad and Assembly Line. Stock Exchanges also help you fund that powerful war machine.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

-Hannibal- Numidian Cavalry makes for a solid early unit--mobile Axemen that get to retreat. Cothon provides an economic boost with extra trade routes. Good traits make for happier cities and more commerce. Though if you're horseless and/or landlocked, this is a less desirable choice.

If you like redcoats or whatever I'm not going to argue against you, but using NUMIDIAN CAVALRY as a reason to support hannibal is a "no".

- NC are weaker against the single most common defender they face - and by enough that they flip to LOSING odds while a regular horse archer would have WINNING odds.
- NC cost as much as stock HA, and also as much as catapults. Relying on withdrawals means waiting to heal in wars where you want to actually make use of mobility to reduce AI chances to build units. They have significant anti-synergy with the best application of horse archers.
- They also cost way more than axes, still lose to spears in the open field (especially hammer for hammer, even with shock), are not materially better vs spears in fortified cities, and lose to opposing horse archers straight up.

Hannibal has good traits and a solid UB. He does *not* have a good UU by any stretch. Despite his UU it's probably better to rush with chariots or melee .

 

[Iranon]

1) Huayna Capac.

Two economy traits for the long game. Quechuas let you laugh at barbarians, allow a dozen little tricks and a hard rush when warranted. A Unique Building that can speed up initial city development quite nicely - on Deity Stonehenge may require unreasonable concessions even with IND and Mysticism.



2) Mansa Musa.

One trait for your economy, one to save a little time and to suck up to potentially useful AIs. a UB that synergises nicely with FIN and a UU that allows you to wage war effectively without regard for resources, and to let an AI wear itself out against your cities/forts.



3) Darius of Persia. Immortals are usually outclassed by War Chariots, but can be even better at abusing a soft target (flatland, no PRO) if you get the opportunity. A solid if boring UB and powerful economy traits secure the third place, with several others breathing down his neck (Ramesses, Elizabeth, both Caesars).

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Someone did the math and found that war chariots break even with immortals with 85% defenses on archers.

Yeah...that would be an unpromoted archer in a 20% city with 95% as long as it is fortified X_X.

 

[Iranon]

I know, and that may have been me

Although if it was, the 85% was from empirical research; strength ratio is only in War Chariots' favour above 150% and I get lost in calculations that take first strikes into account.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I know, and that may have been me

Although if it was, the 85% was from empirical research; strength ratio is only in War Chariots' favour above 150% and I get lost in calculations that take first strikes into account.

A worldbuilder test where you plop each next to an archer and compare the %, while empirical, is a reproducible and common game situation so pretty valid. If you're saying that's what you did there's no reason to dispute the outcome.

The real test comes when each has combat I (which makes sense). War chariots get a .1 str bonus there, and along with the first strikes that might be why the break even threshold is lower than expected. I've seen combat II horse archers hit archers at higher odds than CR I swords, so base str + FS immune fudging can really make a difference.